Following nationwide trends, gas prices are on the rise in Colorado — and nowhere is that more apparent than in the High Country.
According to AAA data as of Wednesday, Feb. 21, the average price per gallon in Colorado was $2.91, up 26 cents over the past month but still below the national average of $3.27.
“Nothing abnormal is going on with the rise of gas prices in Colorado or across the country,” said Colorado AAA spokesperson Skyler McKinley, adding that the price increase can be attributed to “strong demand, tightened supply — which is normal for this time of year — and the hiccup of a major refinery being down.”
Mountain areas including Summit, Eagle, Pitkin and Routt counties continue to see some of the highest gas prices in the state while Colorado’s Front Range has some of the lowest.
Pitkin County, home to Aspen, was reported to have the highest gas price average in the state at $4.30 per gallon. Southern mountain areas such as San Miguel County, which includes Telluride, had a per-gallon average of $3.60. More central and northern mountain areas such as Eagle, Summit, Grand and Routt counties had averages between $3.57 and $3.20.
By comparison, Denver and Boulder County’s per gallon average was $2.88, while in Jefferson County, which includes Golden, the average was $2.86.
According to McKinley, the reasons for those price discrepancies vary, but a major factor is the added effort it takes to transport gas to rural and mountain communities.
“It’s difficult to traverse mountain passes. It’s farther away from the terminal. All of that puts a slight surcharge on gas,” McKinley said.
Mountain areas also have fewer gas stations, meaning there’s less competition for consumer demand, which is driven by ski tourism and tends be higher than Front Range areas. Most gas stations share contracts with the same trucking companies as well, meaning their transit costs are typically fixed, McKinley added.
“I would say the healthy difference between the mountain communities and the Front Range is 35 cents,” McKinely said, though he added the difference usually becomes larger during the summer.
Motorists may find more expensive gas in areas alongside major transit corridors, with McKinley giving the example of a station in Silverthorne that sits near an exit for Interstate 70. Those stations essentially carry a “convenience charge” for tourists while prices could be 40 cents less further into town, McKinley said.
Nationwide, gas prices are expected to continue to rise between now and September, with some ebb and flow along the way.
“We have officially entered the time of year when gas prices traditionally start their spring fling, but we’ve already seen the streak of consecutive increases in the national average hit four weeks,” stated Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy, in a Feb. 19 report from the company.
Some of that has been fueled by the shutdown of the BP Whiting Refinery in Indiana following a plant-wide power outage on Feb. 1. A similar issue hit Colorado last year when the Suncor Commerce City Refinery near Denver faced a multi-month shutdown after a cold snap caused a series of failures.
As Colorado’s only refinery and its main source for gas, the Suncor shutdown caused pump prices to spike to more than $4 on average.
Looking to the rest of 2024, one of “the most critical elements to how much gas prices will climb is how quickly and effectively refiners can finish their pre-summer maintenance, start producing EPA-mandated summer gasoline, and build up supply of it before Memorial Day,” Haan stated.
By the beginning of this summer, Denver’s Suncor refinery will begin producing more expensive reformulated gasoline, which produces less ozone-related fumes. The switch is a federal requirement imposed by the Environmental Protection Agency in response to Colorado’s worsening air quality along the Front Range.
McKinley expects the increased cost to produce it will be passed onto consumers.
“This will probably be more expensive than your average summer if you’ve lived in Colorado, though probably not as expensive as last year,” he said.